Losing Time (Lost Time, Book 1): A Time Travel Romantic Suspense Series

by Nicola Claire

  I could see the handcuffs hanging from his belt from here.

  Shit!

  The officer talking nodded for his partner to move forward while he continued to aim that real gun at my chest. The other one replaced his own weapon in its holster on his hip, velcroing it in place - it’s strange what you notice at times like this - and then retrieving the handcuffs from farther along his thick belt.

  I looked around frantically for my sister, half crazy with fright and a whole lot pissed off at the situation. I could just imagine Carrie watching from the White Room laughing her arse off.

  The cold bite of steel did it. I started to cry.

  How had my life become so surreal? How had my world turned upside down? They'd never accept me into the astronaut training programme now.

  A hitched breath - halfway between sob and laughter - left me, as the officer hauled me to my feet and led me to their truck. I realised on closer inspection that it wasn't a police car; more like Kennedy Space Center Security minus the KSC logo. Nice. Keeping it all low key.

  Maybe I could avoid official arrest, after all.

  The ride was silent and uncomfortable. I couldn't find my balance what with my hands tied behind my back. But the distance, at least, was short. Even if any childhood dreams of joining NASA's space programme were now well and truly thwarted, I'd at least made it to the Launch Control Center. Right next to the VAB.

  I snuck a glance in through the massive over-height doors of the Vehicle Assembly Building and saw a jagged, smoking hole in the side of the building, leading away toward Launch Pad 39A.

  No wonder they weren't talking arrest; they'd just had a major incident and civilians had been caught in the crossfire. The threat of a lawsuit was probably forefront on their minds.

  My stomach churned as the puzzle pieces came together. Carrie had been taken out by my dream.

  My eyes landed on the sixty-three-metre high American flag painted on the side of the VAB and the reality of what had happened hit hard. Carrie was gone. And I was in a foreign country. I might have grown up with American culture in TV shows and movies. I might have dreamt of one day working here and being part of that American Dream. But even though I spoke their language, this land was still so very foreign to me. The sheer might and vast power of the place dwarfed me. Made it hard to breathe.

  I automatically moved to rub my temples, my head pounding, only to fall over sideways when my wrists met resistance, and consequently tangle myself up in the seatbelt.

  One look from the officer who opened my door said it all. What planet had I landed from?

  What world had I arrived in?

  The officer extricated me with surprising care and assisted me down from the super-sized vehicle. Then led me towards the Launch Control Center. Even as my eyes darted everywhere trying to take in each minute detail of this iconic building, my mind reeled attempting to make sense of what had happened. Of what might still happen once I got inside there. I'd been in police stations before, rescuing Carrie and her friends from protest rally mix-ups. But visiting them as a rescuer was a different thing altogether than walking into one in handcuffs. Of course, this wasn't a police station, but it sure as hell had the appearance of one.

  X-Ray machines and security gates. Closed circuit video cameras and surly looking receptionists. More of the same uniformed officers as the two escorting me. Hard eyes landed on my face as we progressed through the entrance area. Some scowled. Some rested their hands on their holstered weapons. If they were afraid of being sued, then they had a strange way of avoiding inflaming a situation.

  I hunched my shoulders and kept my head down, not even taking in the LCC in all its glory.

  The officers took me to a small room straight out of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. The requisite harsh lighting, small table and two chairs made up the entirety of the whitewashed room. I sat down without having to be told, the handcuffs removed in utter silence. Other than the two sentences shouted at me when they’d arrived at the launch pad, the officers hadn't said a word.

  The door clicked shut behind them, and I waited. My mind running over the turn of events and Carrie's bizarre disappearance unsuccessfully. No matter which way I looked at it, I couldn't make sense of a damn thing.

  One minute she was there.

  The next she was not.

  The minutes ticked by and became hours. I knocked on the door demanding attention and received none. If I was being watched, I couldn't see the camera or two-way mirror. Eventually, I gave up hammering on the locked door and yelling myself hoarse and sat down in the chair resting my head on the table.

  And that's where they found me. Two suit wearing men who screamed FBI or NSA.

  I was in so much trouble.

  I sat back and took in the hard glint in the eyes of the dark blue suit wearing official. The salt and pepper ex-military haircut. The chiselled jawline they write about in books. Next to him was a slightly scruffier version, with a slightly less officious look, in a brown suit with equally short but somehow not military-esque hairstyle, this time in brown. To match the suit.

  Brown suit was FBI, then.

  Blue suit was the one to be wary of.

  "Miss Wylde," brown suit began. "I'm Special Agent Carter. FBI." Bingo. "This is Special Agent Dawson from the NSA." Two for two. "Do you understand what we are?" His question was delivered with a friendly smile. I didn't trust it.

  "Federal agents," I said quietly.

  "Do you understand what we do?" Still in that friendly tone I didn't trust.

  I shook my head.

  "We investigate domestic criminal activity." It sounded so simple, save for that one word.

  "Am I the criminal in this situation?" I asked, working hard to keep my voice level.

  Carter pulled out the opposite chair to mine and sat. Dawson remained mute, aloof, and threatening.

  "You tell me," Special Agent Carter asked.

  "My sister…"

  "Yes," Carter interrupted. "Carolyn Abigail Wylde. Twenty-five years old. Native of New Zealand. What about her? Care to tell us where she went?”

  If he was aiming for all-knowing and creepy, he was nailing it. The fake friendly smile only increased the Twilight Zone feel.

  I clenched my fists in a sudden spurt of rage. Both men noticed. But I'd had enough. It happens.

  "She was fine until you lost control of one of your rockets!” That hole in the VAB had to have been caused by something.

  Carter leant forward. Dawson remained statue still.

  "What rocket?”

  I snorted. "Great. You're going to deny it. What? My word against yours? And I'm not backed by the U.S. Government.”

  "What rocket, Miss Wylde?”

  I shook my head and firmed my lips into a thin line.

  Carter sighed. "I can't help you if you don't talk.”

  I made a scoffing sound. Carter frowned. The first time his facial expression appeared remotely believable.

  He stared at me for a long moment and then shrugged, standing up from the table and moving into the corner of the room. I worked hard on not showing a reaction. But when Dawson came forward and sat himself down where Carter had been, it was almost impossible to hide my fear.

  He pulled a file out of nowhere and proceeded to open it, flipping through pages methodically.

  "A Master of Science from the University of Auckland." I blinked. "Double major in Chemistry and Biology. Part way through your Ph.D. Quite impressive." I was sure he'd been impressed by greater things than my degree. And probably greater things than my still unfinished Ph.D.

  "Did you use a bomb?" Dawson suddenly said, breaking into my musings with the power of a sledgehammer. Or C4 explosion.

  “Wh...what?"

  "To damage the Vehicle Assembly Building," he said conversationally. "What did you and your sister have planned for Launch Pad 39A?”

  “I..."

  "We've got you on camera," he added. "No bags, so we assume the bomb was placed earlier,
and you were planning your next move. But we don't understand why the bomb went off now. Before you had a chance to sabotage the launch pad.”

  This was crazy. Completely insane.

  "Make a mistake, Miss Wylde?”

  "What? No!”

  "Your sister then? Is that why you had a falling out?”

  "We didn't fall out…"

  "Did she sabotage your plans? Desert you? Leave you to take the blame.”

  "She vanished…"

  "And set the explosion off while you were still there.”

  "She didn't explode anything!”

  "So, you admit the bomb was all yours?”

  "What? No!”

  "You keep saying that, but your sister is missing, and there's a hole in the side of the VAB. And the only person left standing is you.”

  I started shaking my head.

  “You have the skills and knowledge," Dawson insisted. "You came directly to the Kennedy Space Center upon landing in Florida. You haven't even visited a theme park.”

  "I like science. NASA.”

  "Then why sabotage Orion?”

  "I didn’t..."

  "Three people are dead, Miss Wylde." Oh, God. "Because of you.”

  “No!"

  "No?" He shook his head, abruptly stood up, and produced a set of handcuffs from his back pocket.

  I admit I flinched when he snapped them on.

  "Let's see if we can jog your memory," Dawson said harshly, dragging me from the relative safety of the interview room.

  We passed no one. The entire ten-minute walk was devoid of people.

  Until we got there. To the VAB.

  It was huge. Enormous. I could picture Saturn V rockets standing tall inside its enormous walls. The largest building by volume in the world and I was dragged unceremoniously into it without an ounce of fanfare. My hands cuffed securely at my back, Special Agent Dawson of the NSA fisting the collar of my shirt tightly. Carter now the brooding, silent one at our backs.

  People stopped what they were doing and watched; the looks I received here so much more lethal. These people wanted me dead. Dead like the three tarpaulin covered forms on the scorched concrete.

  Dawson tugged me over towards the bodies and the hole in the wall. It was big, bigger than me. And yet on the side of the Vehicle Assembly Building, it seemed tiny.

  "Is this what you and your sister wanted?" he demanded. "Death on U.S. soil? A halt to Orion? What's your endgame?" He shook me roughly. "Who do you align with?" Another shake. Another teeth clattering rough-up. "What's your manifesto?”

  Words and demands spewed out of him, too quick for me to translate. My brain was on shutdown, my eyes glued to the still forms under the sheets, a humid breeze slipping in through the gaping hole on the side of the structure, but unable to touch me.

  "You'll be lucky if you ever see New Zealand again," Dawson hissed in my ear.

  I looked up at him. I saw no softness there. They thought I was a terrorist. They thought I’d done this. They thought I had a message to deliver to the world.

  Something had happened here that they didn't understand. And if they didn't, then how could I? Carrie was missing.

  Three men were dead.

  And I was about to be locked away for a very long time for something I had no hand in.

  "I want a lawyer," I said numbly.

  Dawson sneered. "I thought you would." He spun me around and started to drag me away, but another agent approached; halting us in our tracks. Shoving me to my knees, making the hard concrete bite into flesh, he growled, "Stay put.”

  I bit back a cry of pain, but he'd already turned away.

  I realised I was panting slightly; my wrists were chafed raw where the too tight cuffs had dug in. Bruises were forming on my knees, my upper arm where the agent had gripped me, and deep inside my chest. My head hurt. My heart ached. I felt so very alone.

  The weight of accusatory glares weighed down on me, bowing my back, hunching my shoulders. Making it even harder to catch my breath.

  This couldn't be happening. This was a nightmare.

  Carrie. Carrie and her stupid dream chasing.

  Oh, God. Carrie.

  Then on that wretched thought, bizarrely and suddenly, a billowing, surreal cloud started to form around me. I blinked rapidly, but the vision didn’t waver. Rust reds and deep mauves, shot through with sunlight yellow. I was sure I was hallucinating. It flowed mesmerisingly, billowing up as high as the one-hundred-sixty-metre tall roof. I stared at it dumbfounded. It engulfed me, little pinpricks of dazzling bright lights blinding, sparkling behind my eyelids.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  And then a roar of jet-like engines engulfed me, followed by the eerie and utter silence of space.

  Mouse

  Jack

  The communicator buzzing woke me from a vivid dream. So real I could have sworn I felt her. I shook my head, trying to dislodge the disquieting sensation of realism where reality did not exist and reached for the device on my bedside table.

  "Yes?" I said into the mouthpiece; experience of abrupt awakenings having me sounding far more alert than I actually was.

  "Dr Evans," a voice said clearly in my ear. "We've got a rip in the fabric. It's...It's rather big, sir.”

  "Bigger than yesterday’s?"

  "The biggest we've seen yet. Dr Crawford thinks it might be an originating tear.”

  "Does he?" I queried doubtfully. Clive Crawford would have us believing our troubles were almost over every other day. I knew better. "I'll be right there." The communicator chirped as the dispatcher disconnected without another word.

  Clearly ruffled.

  I scrubbed a hand over my face, trying to dislodge the sensation of disquiet which had invaded my mind since waking. The dream didn't help. They never did. Making quick work of freshening up, I was dressed in a standard jumpsuit and striding down the hallway to control. If this was a category one rip, then we needed to fly immediately.

  I walked into utter chaos. Which wasn't saying much, RATS was often in chaos.

  "What have you got?" I said, moving to the dispatcher's screen.

  "The rip appeared five minutes ago, sir," she replied curtly. "It set off all the alarms immediately.”

  I studied the sinusoid on the screen feeling unsettled. Something about this one was going to be big. Not just the height of the curve, nor the length. It was the colour. Bright orange. The same International Orange as our flight suits.

  "I don't like the look of this one, Jack," a gruff voice said from over my shoulder. I swung a gaze towards my colleague, but my eyes were soon back on the sine wave on the screen.

  "Crawford," I said in way of greeting.

  "That colour," he murmured, mirroring my thoughts exactly.

  "Well, only one way to find out," I offered. "My team?" I asked the dispatcher. I always seemed to forget her name. Susan? Sarah? They changed so often.

  "Your Intern is Rafe Hoffman. Your Novitiate Sally Groves.”

  I nodded my head, accepting the printout she handed me, as Crawford said, "Do you think it wise?”

  I arched a brow in question. Clive Crawford could talk in riddles until the cows came home.

  "Training on a mission such as this," he clarified.

  "It's standard procedure," I argued.

  "This hardly looks standard, Jack, and you know it." He huffed out a breath, flapping his jowls in consternation. My gaze drifted back to the screen.

  "Is there ever anything standard about what we do, Clive?”

  He humphed good-naturedly, but I felt his disquiet. I recognised it. It matched mine.

  Why did the wave have to be orange?

  Why now? After that dream.

  Dreams weren't unusual for Surgeons. But such vivid ones? I could swear I still smelled her perfume.

  "Are the others ready?" I asked the dispatcher.

  "Meeting you on the pad, Doctor.”

  "Will you watch the launch from here, Clive?" I asked the RATS Chi
ef Surgeon. "Or from the pad itself?”

  Clive met my eyes, the worry and concern I saw before shielded behind his usual affable façade.

  "Wouldn't miss it, old boy!" he said jovially, slapping me on the shoulder and picking up his walking stick. I followed him from the room, as he limped away from me, his gait more pronounced than normal. Perhaps his way of reminding me just how wrong missions could go.

  The hangar was chilly this early in the morning, but hardly sleepy. Technicians hustled to and fro, tablet computers or simple screwdrivers in hand. Excitement ripe on the air. Even a few Surgeons who weren't scheduled to fly were gathered in the observation room. Crawford offered a firm handshake and then limped towards them. His presence alone heightening the mood.

  I let out a slow breath of air and approached my flight crew.

  "Good morning," I said in greeting, catching the attention of Rafe Hoffman and Sally Groves.

  "Dr Evans," the Novitiate greeted. "It's a pleasure to be assigned to your command, sir.”

  I returned her smile out of habit, accepting Hoffman's silent handshake while I did it.

  "Have you seen the colour?" Rafe asked.

  "Yes." I studied the MPCV, then started to make my visual pre-flight check. Hoffman and Groves followed as I walked the circumference of the Vehicle.

  "Do you think..?" Rafe began.

  "We won't know until we plot the course," I said, interrupting him.

  "Sure," he offered, but I heard the unsaid. He was worried too.

  Why did it have to be orange?

  "It's not likely to be anything too dangerous, though, is it?" Groves stated. I halted in my tracks. Rafe pretended he hadn't heard her and kept on walking.

  "I mean," she said, "you wouldn't take a Novitiate with you if it were. Would you?”

  I studied her for a moment. She'd been trailing Bryan Fawkes for the past twelve weeks, doing rather well from what he'd relayed. But this line of questioning was a concern.

  "What is it we do here, Miss Groves?" I asked quietly.

  "We mend Time, sir.”

  "And of the many trips you've undertaken with Dr Fawkes were there any in which things did not go well?”

  She bit the side of her lower lip in consideration, a wisp of her tightly coiled brunette hair floating down over hazel eyes. She was petite and pretty. And from all reports highly intelligent. But intelligence only got you so far at RATS. Playing Surgeon to Time took courage.